Bahram Radan deleted tweet in support of US supreme court decision after criticism from hardline media and homophobic abuse

According to The Guardian, a leading Iranian actor has apologised after coming under pressure over a tweet he posted in support of a historic US supreme court ruling on gay marriage.

Bahram Radan, who is known as the Iranian Brad Pitt, created controversy in the country when his tweet hailed a verdict last week which made same-sex marriage a legal right across the entirety of the US. Homosexuality remains a taboo subject inside the Islamic republic and is punishable by death.

"The US supreme court's ruling that same-sex marriage is legal was historic, perhaps on the scale of the end of slavery ... from Lincoln to Obama," the award-winning actor tweeted in Persian at the weekend.

But within a few hours, after many users bombarded him with homophobic abuse and hardline media criticised him, Radan deleted the tweet.

"I know that not all Christians are right-wing extremist terrorists, but why are all right-wing extremist terrorists Christians?"

This is the question I'm never asked. But as somebody who actually knows something about Islam and about the complex history of Muslim relations with Jews and Christians, I am often asked the following: "I know that not all Muslims are terrorists, but why are all terrorists Muslim?"

Last week, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, a member of St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Columbia, walked into a study session at the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. After sitting for an hour he shot nearly everybody at the meeting. That was an act of terror. He was not a Muslim. As far as we know he was acting alone, like the Tsarnaev brothers, though both were undoubtedly influenced by organized groups through social media and other electronic sources. Was Christianity the motivation for Roof's brutal violence?

One could make the case. The Christian Crusades were a violent European military movement directed not only against infidels, but against people of color living outside the boundaries of Europe. That's a parallel to the argument that I often hear among non-Muslims that Muslims were bent on a violent conquest against all infidels. But more to the point, many of the white supremacist groups in the US are united under the banner of "Christian Unity," while the Ku Klux Klan websiteclaims that its "better way" is "the Christian way."

A deeply divided Supreme Court on Friday delivered a historic victory for gay rights, ruling 5 to 4 that the Constitution requires that same-sex couples be allowed to marry no matter where they live.

The court's action rewarded years of legal work by same-sex marriage advocates and marked the culmination of an unprecedented upheaval in public opinion and the nation's jurisprudence.

Marriages began Friday in states that had previously thwarted the efforts of same-sex couples to wed, while some states continued to resist what they said was a judicial order that changed the traditional definition of marriage and sent the country into uncharted territory. As of the court's decision Friday morning, there were 14 states where same-sex couples were not allowed to marry.

Accreditations

Visit AAI on Social Networks

Join AAI

AAI is a non-profit international organization registered in California, USA as a 501(c)(3) US corporation. We survive on your donations and support. Click here to VOLUNTEER your time or click here to DONATE to Atheist Alliance International.

Disclaimer: AAI content and links may be from other Internet sources and should be viewed with discreation. AAI reserves full indemity for all content, links, and assumes no liability for media on other websites. AAI does not permit discrimination. Contact AAI immediately for any questions or requests regarding AAI website media.